During the first year or two of marriage your Russian lady will encounter many difficulties. After living in the U.S. for more than 7 years and meeting a number of Russian wives, I noticed that regardless of age, status and experience all women I met had difficulties dealing with four things: language, inability to make friends easily, homesickness and understanding of the money system in America.
1. Friends. The concept of friendship in Russia is different. When someone calls you a friend in Russia it actually means a lot. You don’t call your college drinking buddies friends (they call them acquaintances) and you don’t call a friend a person whose birthday you can’t remember. A friend for a Russian person is someone very close to them, like a close family member, someone they can fully trust and not just someone they hang out with or someone they had dinner a few times. There is a saying that you can’t have too many friends. It is true, because friendships (in Russian definition) require time, work and dedication.
As you can imagine, it is not easy to find such friends quickly. It took me years to find good friends and develop strong connections back home. This is why it was so difficult to leave these people behind. We are still in touch with most of them, but it is not the same as having them live nearby.
My American acquaintances (notice, I don’t say “friends”) and relatives were doing their best to help me find friends. My father-in-law went to the dentist one day and discovered that the technician was Russian. I remember how excited he was when he told me that he found a Russian “friend”. He brought me the woman’s phone number and gave it to me with such a triumph on his face that I felt bad knowing that I will never call this number. Actually, if I did the other woman would probably freak out, because it is not socially acceptable in Russian culture to find “friends” this way.
2. Homesickness. I think it is safe to say that every immigrant experiences homesickness to some extent. It is hard not to miss your country, your town, your apartment, your friends and family. Many Russians and Eastern-Europeans are nationalistic and they do love their motherland, so it is never easy for them to adapt to a different culture, but in most cases the adaptation process doesn’t last more than a year and the longer your Russian lady stays in the country, the more she will be comfortable living in it.
3. Language. Even if your wife went to a linguistic university, she still may have difficulties with American English. In most Russian schools British English is taught and it is quite different from American. For a native speaker it may seem like there is not much difference, but for a foreigner it is a bit different. American grammar is much easier than British, so if your wife learned British English, she will learn the American differences quickly.
The two biggest language challenges that your Russian lady will most likely face are slang (which is not taught in schools and is not found in the dictionary) and accent (which differs from state to state).
4. Money. The American money system is pretty complicated for most Eastern Europeans. Mortgages, second mortgages, different kinds of taxes, interest rates, insurances, multiple retirement accounts – these surely can make your head spin even if you grew up in this country. In Russia, Ukraine and Belarus everything is simple. There are no taxes (they are taken out before you get your paycheck), most people use cash to pay for pretty much everything and families don’t feel the need to buy a new place to live because it is normal to live with your parents. She will be able to grasp the concept eventually, but just a friendly warning: Don’t tell your Russian lady that you are 200K in debt (mortgage) without explaining her how things work in the U.S. History shows, she will panic.
